Eating habits

When I was little, I observed my grand parents farming. They had a little farm, with cows on the fields, roaming the rocky landscape of the Swedish island Tjörn, chicken running around and hiding their eggs in some cases, making my grandmother go and look for them. She had fake eggs though, so she could trick the chicken to lay their eggs in certain spots. Being naïve (at age 12 or so), I thought that's how all farming was being done in the world. Then I grew up, realising that theirs was what was later to be classified as (very) ecological farming.

The last few years, I've taken an interest in what I eat. Especially since I live in this location, where lots of meat is being imported from the US, a place where hormonal treatment of livestock seems to be a normal thing. During this my extra-curricular research, many a disturbing story has reached my ears/eyes, and I've decided that I do not feel comfortable eating meat from a host animal that has been treated in a way with which I do not agree - i.e. a way I would not treat it. Question to readers - what are your feelings about this? And how do you justify them? I'm not asking this in a confrontational way, I am just interested.

One of my biggest issues, familiar to those who've ever discussed this with me, are eggs. The sacrifice involved in choosing a package of eggs from free-roaming chicken (a.k.a. "free roaming eggs" :) is in most cases negligible - most people can afford the extra few dollars a month, to get eggs from happi(er) birds. They are available in all stores, you don't have to go looking for them, and they have stronger shells (a sign of healthier hens laying them). So this is a case where I tend to be pretty firm - buy free-roaming eggs, people! (Question #2: do you buy free-roaming eggs, why/why not, and could you consider starting, why/why not?) (this question I'll freely admit, is more confrontational* in its nature, but please don't refrain from answering, I'll love you anyways...)

(*I am a big opponent of contention due to confrontation otherwise. It just never works. The free-roaming eggs issue is the one "luxury" I allow myself, due to the above reason - the lack of sacrifice involved. This doesn't mean I never fall for the temptation to be confrontational in other matters. It is however not endorsed by myself, and I try not to - because it never works.)

I recently came across an article about a movie taken by an employee/spy at a hatchery, i.e. a farm where incredible amounts of chicken are being hatched, to be sold on to egg-farms. Obviously only female chicken can do the job. The story's scary part is that what happens to the male chickens is rather gruesome: they are being ground alive. For the not-so-fainthearted, the story and the movie are available in links (click the word) (no, I could not watch. I love birds, the mere thought gives me nightmares)

Actually, what bugs me the most is not the main reason for the story, but what lies behind it, and here's where I'm faced again with my own naïveté: I always thought male chicken were grown to be slaughtered for food. Why are they then being killed as little yellow fuzzballs? The reason is mentioned in the article: They don't grow fast enough. Is there anyone else that finds this just slightly disturbing..? Ok, so I've heard about how chicken have been selectively bred to be as big as possible in as short a time as possible (it takes 50% less time today compared to 1950 for a chicken to reach 2 kg, which I personally find disturbing). But killing all these male chicken, because they are male and because they don't grow fast enough, is to me, a sign that the society's need for cheap meat fast has gone a bit too far (opinions?). I guess it is too expensive and unfeasible to ship them to starving countries?

(Yes, I'm obviously disturbed about the way they are being killed as well. I'm not going to go into that topic though, because that is entirely based on feelings, and is nothing I can logically argue about - everyone dies at some point, and there will in most cases be discomfort involved. It is obscene if we as humans don't choose the most "humane" way of killing animals so they would not have to suffer needlessly due to barbaric methods, when there are other options available to us, unlike the case for an eagle snatching the chick from the ground for instance - but my main issue in this particular text is that they should have had acceptable - calm and happy - lives before getting it ended.)

In all my research on this topic - diets, common sicknesses in developed countries, handling of animals, etc etc, I've come to the conclusion that people eat way too much meat. Mind you, since my own topic of research is astrophysics, I don't claim to be an expert on this. My findings are based upon research of other people, thoughts and opinions of other people, mixed with my own view of life, and attempts to see this from all different angles (the Word of Wisdom might have something to do with it as well). Thus, I don't expect you to immediately agree with all that I write. I would however love it if you do your own research (trying to see and understand all different angles available), mix with your own understanding of life, and come to your own conclusions (feel free to share those here))

I'm not arguing for complete vegetarianism, even though I'm getting closer and closer to it myself. I do however argue for a healthy lifestyle of flexitarianism, Theresa-version. This includes: Eat well, not too much and mainly vegetables**. Eat meat perhaps once a week (I try to do it even less at times, and the meat I choose is mainly fish), and choose organic/ecological meat from farms in the neighbourhood if possible (bringing down unnecessary transporting is another issue I'm not going into this time, but I think that most people would agree with that somewhat). Make your own bread (a bread machine is a wonderful tool for this) (this advice is mainly for people in north america, whose bread at best is edible, at worst is filled with unnecessary preservatives and sugar) - and avoid sugar! (Chocolate exempt of course...) .

But organic meat is so expensive you might argue. It is. Thus you will automatically diminish your meat consumption. Win-win situation accomplished.

But I don't like eating only veggies, you might say. (How do you know, I ask.) One very nice thing about the internet is the law of recipe posting: in most cases, most people don't post recipes not worth posting (unless they have a lousy taste I guess). Thus, I've never found a recipe that didn't do the trick. There's a neverending supply of amazing flexitarian recipes around. I will shamelessly advertise mine and my best friend's phenomenal site Sofias och Theresas fenomenala recept. Don't get fooled by the seemingly Swedish title and text - Our tireless translator Steve is doing a great job translating most of them, and google translate does the trick rather nicely in other cases. If not, just send us a line, and we'll tend to it. This site includes recipes of every different kind, in fact, the number of vegetarian ones is not yet so large (but they are great), so just try to get meat from nicely treated animals for the other recipes.

I challenge you to try one (1) new vegetarian recipe this week! Let me know how it goes. Let me know if you'd like me to send you one.

I was going to post a few links to good articles and blog entries in the end here, but of course I can't find most of them. Until then, here is an excerpt:

** very long article, but very much worth reading (start it up, and skip to the end if out of time): Unhappy meals